“One of the greatest areas of strength they have in terms of tourism is diving, surfing is one of them, and there’s a lot war relics in Manus Island as well.”

Manus is the largest of a group of islands known as the Admiralty Islands, many of which are quite beautiful and have previously hosted tourism ventures in diving and surfing.

But Mr Agus acknowledged while Manus could provide pretty places for tourists to visit, it had little tourism infrastructure and would have to overcome negative perceptions about the offshore detention regime.

“Manus Island is not â€¦ only the detention centre. It’s a big place,” he said.

“There are a lot of things you can see and do — even completely out of sight of the detention centre.

“It’s not about what you hear about and what you read in the papers. There’s a lot of positive things going on in terms of tourism development.”